It’s a mutant!!!!

A mutant By Hand London dress, that is. A hybrid made using the Anna dress bodice and the Charlotte skirt. An Annalotte, if you like. I wore it this weekend for our family Christmukkah gift exchange. My sisters always look impossibly and effortlessly gorgeous and I generally feel like a slightly overchunky frump in their presence so I went all out with this one. Having clothes that actually fit makes an enormous difference, although in retrospect I should probably have included extra space around the middle for food-associated expansion.

Apart from the obvious alteration of chopping about three feet off the skirt length the patterns were used pretty much as is. I cut the back bodice pieces slightly narrower at the centre back to avoid that gaping zip thing (giant baps, tiny back) and it worked a treat (tutorial here). The fabric is this gorgeous cotton sateen used sideways to avoid horizontal stripes, and the bodice is fully lined (I hate facings). All in all I am really happy with this dress, I just need to manufacture some more reasons to wear it.

And, in case you were wondering, this is why I cropped my head off the first photo. That’s about as good as it gets.